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Mumbai, Apr 22 (PTI) Researchers have documented a nearly 35 per cent shortfall in dragonfly and damselfly species historically recorded in the Western Ghats, raising concerns over the status of these ecologically vital insects.
A team of researchers from MIT World Peace University (MIT-WPU), Pune, led by Dr Pankaj Koparde (Assistant Professor) and Reji Chandran (Society for Odonate Studies, Kerala), conducted a research between February 2021 and March 2023, mapping Odonata populations across 144 sites spanning five states.
Odonata is an order of amphibious insects comprising dragonflies and damselflies.
“This study is a result of one of the most extensive Odonata surveys across the Ghats. We see a south to north compositional turnover, which needs
to be studied further. Our surveys could recover only 65 percent of known Odonata fauna of the Ghats, indicating plausible loss of species and habitats,” Dr Koparde said.
The team recorded 143 distinct odonate species, including 40 species endemic to the Western Ghats.
However, the overall count represented only around 65 percent of the species historically known from the region, an alarming gap.
Odonates are highly sensitive to environmental changes because they depend entirely on freshwater ecosystems for reproduction.
Hence, they are widely regarded as “indicator taxa” whose presence or absence directly reflects the ecological health of water bodies.
The missing species, researchers believe, might be early indicators of deeper ecological stress.
The study points to multiple, intensifying threats across the Western Ghats including linear infrastructure development, hydropower projects, severe pollution and large-scale land-use changes.
Additional pressures such as unregulated tourism, recurring forest fires and the growing impact of climate change are further fragmenting and degrading these ecosystems.
The research also highlighted variations across states. Maharashtra, where the highest number of sites (105) were surveyed, recorded 100 species, including 12 endemic ones.
Kerala, despite fewer sampled sites (14), showed a high concentration of endemic diversity with 33 endemic species among 83 recorded.
Karnataka (17 sites) recorded 64 species with 6 endemics, Goa (3 sites) documented 35 species including 4 endemics, while Gujarat (5 sites) recorded 18 species with no endemic species observed. PTI SM KRK
